At the discussion, he told us that the agreement had just been released. He said that when the University was negotiating with Google, they tried to tell Google that it would not take long for a FOIA request to be filed, but that Google naively believed that no one would be interested.

Well, it turns out that Google wasnâ€™t that far off base. The person who filed the FOIA request has sent a letter to the LibraryLaw Blog.

He writes:

Clearly, Google was hoping that no one would notice. They were almost
right — it was nearly five months before I decided to search for “freedom of
information” and “university of michigan.” Shame on me, and even more
shame on everyone else. But the most shame on Google and the U of M,
who should have taken one look at the situation and decided to skip all
the confidentiality language from the start.

It sounds as if U of M did try to skip all the confidentiality language, but Google was unwilling.

About ashkev

The Fiddling Librarian 3.0 is Kevin Smithâ€™s personal weblog. Kevin is a recent graduate with an MLS from IUPUI. Kevin is the Assistant Director of the Cass District Library which is in Cass County Michigan.